Downtown Cincinnati's Court Street Plaza has received a sizeable new public artwork as part of the run-up to this year's BLINK art and light festival.
Officials with the city of Cincinnati, 3CDC and Asianati Thursday evening unveiled "Embrace No Evil" by local artist Tom Tsuchiya on the south side of the plaza.
The fiberglass and stainless steel sculpture is five-feet tall, four-feet long and four-feet deep and emits ambient LED light. Tsuchiya says it is based on the Buddhist and Confucian proverb "see no evil, hear no evil, speak no evil."
"It's my interpretation of the famous, age-old three wise monkeys," Tsuchiya says. "But instead of being represented separate, they're all huddled together embracing. It's a way to symbolize the idea that fighting evil is a community and city effort."
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The sculpture also will play music — including the sounds of Gibbon monkeys — during BLINK, when the plaza is host to the Asianati Night Market. The piece will remain after the festival ends as a permanent public artwork.
Court Street Plaza underwent major renovations by 3CDC and the city of Cincinnati in 2021. The changes were aimed at making the plaza more pedestrian-friendly and attracting new businesses to the block between Walnut and Vine streets.
BLINK runs Oct. 17-20 with murals, light art displays and projection mapping art in downtown Cincinnati, Over-the-Rhine, Covington and Newport.